Griffith v. Benzinger’s Empirical Analysis
1924
Citation profile
4 district · 37 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 41 later decisions — most recently October 2001 · most notably Buck v. Cam's Broadloom Rugs, Inc. (1992), In Re Anthony R. (2000)
4 district · 37 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Jones v. Jones · Hiss v. Weik · Myers v. State · Moore ex rel. Moore v. McDonald · Mayor of New York v. Harlem Bridge, Morrisania & Fordham Railway Co.
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 41 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“But the fact that such relations existed between the decedent and the sole beneficiary under the proposed will is a *Page 143 fact to be considered in connection with other facts bearing upon the question in determining the weight and sufficiency of evidence adduced to show that a will was made as a result of undue influence or fraud. "The weight to be given such a fact must depend largely on the other facts which accompany it, and the circumstances of each particular case, and no more specific or definite rule than this can be formulated, that is, that while the existence of such relations between a testator and a beneficiary under his will is not in itself and by itself sufficient to support an inference that the will was the result of fraud or undue influence, yet it is sufficient to throw suspicion upon the will and to intensify the care and diligence with which courts should examine the facts relating to the execution of it under such circumstances, and it may give to such facts a significance which they might not otherwise have.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“The mere fact that a person maintained illicit relations with another in whose favor a testamentary disposition was made by such person does not in itself raise a presumption of law or of fact that such disposition was obtained by fraud or undue influence, and the general rule embodying that principle is set out in the following language in Alexander on Wills, par. 590:”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.